TV history is littered with one-season wonders: perfectly decent shows that, for a variety of reasons, never made it to series two. Sci-fi TV is a good example, as such shows demand a lot from those who make them and those who watch. Not for them the earthbound police squad or hospital drama, where everyone is familiar with the scenario. They dream a little bigger than that in sci-fi, often creating entire universes, cultures and histories. Space: Above and Beyond, which appeared on Fox in 1995, accomplished a lot. While it didn't last, it still made quite a mark – and influenced much of what followed.

Set in 2063, the show follows the adventures of the Wildcards: a rough, tough land, sea, air and space combat squad serving in the war between mankind and a mysterious alien race dubbed the Chigs. Stationed on their huge spaceship USS Saratoga, the troops embark on exciting missions, either as ground-based infantry or in their Hammerhead fighter rockets.

The show was the creation of James Wong and Glen Morgan, trading off the heat they were generating from their sterling work on The X-Files. In many ways, it's a fine example of stealth sci-fi, since the format and much of the interplay owe more to military shows such as Combat!, The Rat Patrol and Tour of Duty than they do to Star Trek or The Outer Limits.

It turns out humans have just come out of a long and bloody war with their own robots-gone-bad, the Silicates, who have collaborated with the new alien enemy. What's more, there are these artificially gestated humans around: the In-Vitros (Tanks or Nipple Necks, to use the slurs of the show) who are matured at speed then "born" at the age of 18. One of the main Wildcards, Cooper Hawkes, is one such being. Everything about the In-Vitros is brilliantly handled: they are often childlike in their outlook, yet angry at being treated like third-class citizens. Hawkes finds himself uneasily becoming part of a tight team after years of shunning human contact.

Occasionally, traditional battle tales are cleverly updated for the futuristic outer space setting: in one episode, the Wildcards send a captured enemy fighter on a surprise Trojan horse mission, as they believe the Chigs have no equivalent tale in their lore; similarly, a Chig pilot comes to pose a Red Baron-style threat to the humans.

Wong and Morgan's clout meant the show was handsomely mounted, rumoured to have cost around $1m an episode. The special effects may now look like something from a low-rent video game, but they get the job done. Clearly influenced by Starship Troopers (the novel) and Aliens, Space: Above and Beyond in turn cast its own shadow on Starship Troopers (the movie), Battlestar Galactica and Firefly. Five seasons were planned, yet only one was made – a tantalising glimpse of what could have grown into something truly great.